When Is Enough Really Enough

When is Enough Really Enough?

Does one person really have the right to take another’s person’s life? What about the right of the person who’s been sentenced to death? Are the rights of the accused automatically forfeited to the government? We live in a time where capital punishment for minors is one of the most controversial issues regarding legal and moral status. We no longer perceive a distinction between adulthood and childhood when it comes to this issue. At what age is it ethically logical to consider a child as an adult? We have all ready convicted numerous offenders to death at relatively young ages. Society has taken off the blinders when it comes to execution and preceded to take the issue head on and paved the way for a more humanitarian solution. I believe that children should not be tried as adults until the court can prove to me that they are legally adults. Many of the victims of these death convictions lack the mental and moral ability to recognize that what they have done is immoral and ultimately criminal.

Capital punishment echoes the biblical saying that an “eye for an eye” is just. The United states stands alone as the only industrial democracy still with the law on the books. Britain outlawed the punishment in 1965, Canada in 1976, France in 1981, and Germany 1987. Capital Punishment is controversial issue that has been on society’s plate for many generations none of which came to a conclusion on the subject. Juvenile capital punishment is the newest form of capital punishment making headline and stirring up mixed feelings . Juvenile convictions for capital punishment has existed in the United States since 1642 in colonial times. There have been well over 350 documented executions since these times. In modern times 28 juveniles convicted of terrible crimes sit on death row today. Only twenty-four out of fifty states allow courts to hand down death sentences to juvenile offenders. However, twenty-two of the twenty-four allow juvenile convictions under eighteen to be consider for a death sentence. Where will this issue draw its final breath it is hard to believe that after thousands of years of evolution we still rely on an brutal and uncivilized form of punishment for those accused of crimes on society we might as well still burn witches and throw stones at people in public to shame them.

Many supporters of capital punishment for minors will have believe that it will serve as a deterrent for future horrific offense. They also believe that these decisions are justified because these children are aware of what they are doing. They do not believe that teens are in anyway capable of understanding and acknowledging there delinquency. Many of the supporters “If they’re old enough to serve in the armed forces, they’re old enough to be held accountable for capital crimes,” says Austin attorney and former United States Marine William Hubbarth. Many of these same supporters of the capital punishment agree that the mind of a child is no different then that of adults, and that the mind of all humans stop developing at the age of twelve according to many of the top institutions such as UCLA, Harvard and many others. They will also tell you that hormonal imbalances in the body does not have an effect on the way that these individuals react to their environment. The supporters agree in the idea that if they are committing adult crimes they must be mentally and morally ready to handle their consequences, therefore, they must be able to understand what they are doing. If these offenders are convicted of adult crimes, then they must serve adult time, and that includes capital punishment for cold-blooded murders, rapists, and violent individuals.

However, many of these believers are completely and utterly unproductive. Many of the supporters believe capital punishment is a deterrent for crimes of high profiles but in reality, indicators that it does act as a deterrent. A study showed that from 1976 to 1996, executions increased from zero to just under sixty, but the homicide rate per 100,000 population has remained constant at just under 10. The National Center for Juvenile Justice reported that between the years 1987 and 1996, the number of juvenile arrested increased 35 percent and Juvenile violent arrests were up 60 percent a total of 135,000 (224). In 1997 the NCJJ found that “today’s violent youth commits the same number of violent acts as his/her predecessor of 15 years ago”(224). The fact suggest the death penalty is in an inadequate method to reduce the crime rate for juveniles. “Most crimes of violence, particularly those committed by young people, are acts of impulse. They don’t sit down and rationally and logically do a cost/benefit analysis on the pros and cons of what will happen it they get caught”. (211)

If the main reasons that we commit these atrocious acts in the hope